Good Evening My Fellow Introverts,
My name is MDSaga, and I have been dying for a forum like this to be able to tell my stories. I have been bottling these up inside for God knows how long.
As you can see from my profile photo, I am a doctor, and generally this job is fulfilling...Ok, so that is a big, fat lie....Who am I kidding? The majority of times, it is tiring, thankless and mentally taxing. But there are some days that stick out imore than others because they are extra extra disturbing.
Case in point, I remember, one day when I was a young intern, and I was seeing some patients in the Emergency Room. There was a young 14 year old girl who had a cut to her arm. She was accompanied by her mother. I recognized off the bat that the wound needed sutures (stiches) because it was a relatively long laceration. So I set up to do the procedure, no issue. Her mother decided to wait outside as she hated the sight of blood. Initially I was working in silence, just thinking about the time I had left in my shift.
I thought to myself, I guess I should find out how this happened. So I asked her, "Who cut you?"...to which she replied, "my father". Again, there was silence for another 2 mins, maybe longer. During that time I was contemplating - Self, do you really want to know? But I also recognized that I was duty bound to ask. I asked the question - "Why?" To which she responded, "Over some sex thing." Keeping my cool, I inquired "What sex thing?", and she said "I didn't want to give him no more sex, so he cut me with a knife." In disbelief, I questioned her, is this your actual father or step father, And of course she confirmed that it was the former.
It's at this point that I looked at my patient. I mean really looked at her, and I realized that she was wearing a very baggy shirt. And I thought I something protruding from under her garments. So with a feeling of dread I asked another question, "Are you pregnant?" , and within seconds, she confirmed that she was about 5 months pregnant. All I could do was say okay. I kept my composure and finished suturing her arm. After which I ran, not walked to my attending (superior doctor), who promptly summoned the police, and the young lady was carried off to the police station
Some of you may be wondering about the young lady's mother, and to what extent she was involved. The answer is that she knew. She knew about the sexual abuse and the pregnancy, but unfortunately, even though she knew it was wrong as evidenced by her tears when the police did a preliminary questioning, she felt as if she could not intervene. Sadly, the mother was mentally challenged.
So yes, this particular incident actually scarred me, but little did I know at the time that during my career I would be seeing many other distressing situations...
I will be letting you guys have a look at some of the issues I deal with on a daily basis.
Until next time....so long
Comments
I wonder what has become of this unfortunate young woman whose parents failed her miserably
I have absolutely no idea. That's the thing about hospital medicine, especially emergency room cases. There is essentially no follow through.